If You Have Been Looking At Exciting New Careers You Could Undertake, Then Why Don’t You Think About A Career As A Fire fighter?
For people looking for Career ideas that are a little more exciting than your standard 9 to 5 Monday to Friday Careers, then look no further than the fire service. Fire fighters pprovide us with a vital service – they are out there every day putting themselves in danger in order to save lives. There aren’t many Careers out there that can boast to be as thrilling and as important as fire fighting. If you are looking at New careers, then here is some information on the requirements you have to meet in order to become a fire fighter.
For obvious reasons, to become a fire fighter you have to be really fit. Getting a job as a fire fighter requires you to pass tough fitness and medical tests. You will also have to take psychological tests. Fire fighters are often the first ones to scenes of accidents – there may still be people in danger, so fire fighters have to be able to keep calm in emergency situations and be able to make prompt, potentially lifesaving decisions. The physical tests include things such as equipment carrying, and enclosed space tests. These are to make sure you are physically able to undertake this challenging role. The psychological tests are timed tests that supply the candidate with written scenarios, and they are required to say how they would cope with such scenarios. This is to help make sure emotionally you will be able to deal with the job.
As with many New careers, once you complete the recruitment stage, you will be placed into training. Training for the fire service lasts 20 weeks, and is enormously challenging, both psychologically and physically. Not only will you be learning all of the fundamental skills mandatory to a fire fighter, such as equipment operation, including breathing apparatus and ladder safety, you will also be looking at fire prevention and fire safety. This will include classroom training and you will be expected to study and revise for this.
Once you pass your training, you will be put on probation for a full year, and you will be monitored closely to make sure you can cope withdeal with the job. Fire fighters typically work a shift system where they work 2 days on, then 2 nights on, then 4 days off, equivalent to a 42 hour week.
Once you are out of probation, you can follow a well structured career path. This is ideal if your existing Career ideas involve moving up in the world and taking on more responsibilities. Promotion within the fire service is entirely on individual merits, so you will have to work very hard if you want to progress. The career path typically begins with progression to lead fire fighter, then sub officer, then station officer. After that you can advance into areas like regional director for the fire service, vital roles with a lot of responsibility. So as you can see, fire fighting is among the most vital and exhilarating Careers out there, and well worth a look if you are wanting to do something better with your life.
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